(Life: It’s more about the journey than whether you actually beat Travis Pastrana in arm wrestling. Pic: Zimbio)
Ah, Quinton “Rampage” Jackson. At this point, we honestly don’t know if we should applaud the guy for his honesty or criticize him for continuing to waste everybody’s time. After conducting a lengthy interview with the former UFC light heavyweight champion recently wherein it becomes painfully apparent that the guy just can’t bring himself to be terribly dedicated to fighting anymore, maybe Five Knuckles says it best. As the MMA website quips in the very first line of its resulting story about Jackson: “You can call Quinton “Rampage” Jackson a lot of things, but dedicated isn’t necessarily one of them.”
Dude, ouch. Then again, that seems like a pretty apt description anymore. Heading into his upcoming bout with Matt Hamill at UFC 130, Rampage claims he’s training hard, but says he hasn’t bothered to chase down any film on Hamill and even admits he “doesn’t know a whole lot” about the guy. Really? You don’t know a whole lot about Matt Hamill? Interesting. Anyway, a bit later on Jackson flat out admits he’s just biding his time until he can find another movie role that will compensate him as much or more than his current UFC contract.
“As soon as movies start paying me more than I make to fight, I’m gone,” Jackson says. “It don’t hurt to make movies. It don’t hurt that bad. Every day I train. Every day I’m like, ‘Man, I can’t wait until I get another big movie’ … I don’t have the type of blood Randy Couture has. I give it up to him. I take my hate (sic) off to that guy, but I’m not that guy. I don’t plan on fighting until I’m 40. And I’m not Chuck Liddell. I’m not coming to work inside the UFC office when I retire. That’s not me. I’m an entertainer, I like making people laugh. I like doing movies, action moves and stuff like that. I might even try to be a comedian one day, who knows?”
Again, hard to blame the guy. Fighting is hard work and by comparison the movie business – with its trailers and craft services and production assistants who’ll just back down from any confrontation over who is the real “faggot” – probably seems like paradise. On the other hand, the very fact that being a fighter is so hard is precisely what makes Jackson’s admission that he doesn’t really like doing it anymore so troubling. Don’t know about you, but we’re not sure this is the right sport for half-assers. Conventional wisdom says that it’s going to be hard to continue to compete at MMA’s highest level when your level of deciation is in any way less than 100 percent. Not sure it’ll translate to those “exciting” fights everyone is always hungry for, either.
Oh, and also? Please God, for the love of all things sacred and holy, please never let “Rampage” Jackson get near a live microphone on a public stage in any kind of “comedic” type setting. That would just be bad news for everyone.
But anyway, by way of closing we’d like to leave you with one final quote from Jackson about his recently reported nightclub run-in with longtime rival Rashad Evans. While Jackson disputes the previously alleged version of the encounter – we’ll save you the details on that – he admits slapping Evans. Rampage just wants everyone to know that the whole thing was Rashad’s fault, since Rashad approached him when he’d been drinking. Hanging out in a night club. Just trying to be a human being.
“He wouldn’t rub me the wrong way if he wasn’t the one walk up to me in a night club, where I have to smack him,” Jackson says. “In a night club, most likely, I’d been drinking and that’s the worst time to get on my nerves …. If I’m in a night club and I’m kickin’ it with some girls and I’m on the dance floor, I’m just being a human being, don’t come bother me. Don’t come try and take a picture, don’t come ask me, don’t come challenge me and don’t say no B.S. to me … He knows the only reason he beat me is because I was rusty and I was injured.”